I never wanted children. I never had any interest in them. But when J came home from his mom’s out east, and he came running in and threw his arms around me and said “I missed you so much” my heart sang.
He was eager to tell us all about the two weeks he spent with his mom, who now lived full time with her dad and his girlfriend. As well as the time he spent with his sister who is in college.
When the children were first dumped on us in March 2025, our world was completely upended. She’d lost her job, her car and was getting evicted the next day.
We had an 18-year-old girl whose mom was filling her head with fantasies “it’ll only be a week” and a 13-year-old boy who didn’t even know what was going on until the day of.
After R graduated, she immediately went with her mom. Rules are not really her thing, and she was resentful that her father had not saved her mother.
J however, acclimated very well to the structure we had established in the last 3 months.
Phone on the charger at 8:30, lights out and in bed by 10:00.
No video games during the week. You’re welcome to watch TV or to read a book.
Dinner every night with the family, no snacks before dinner, and no dessert unless you ate all your dinner including the vegetables.
Not only did he acclimate, but he thrived, he began talking about getting a job as soon as he turned 14. Saving up for a desktop PC so he could play games with his new friends.
These were kids who had saved their allowances and worked hard to buy PCs and games rather than just had them handed to them for Christmas.
We wholeheartedly encouraged this. These were the kind of kids we wanted him to hang out with. The kind of kids who understood the value of a dollar, and had good work ethic even at 14.
We were nervous about him going to his mom’s for 2 weeks, we were excited he was going to spend time with family, but we’re nervous and all the hard work we’d put into him would be done.
They were big weed smokers. And his grandfather was a world-class enabler.
But we bit our tongue, and off he went.
I should have had more faith in him. First words out of his mouth were “it’s good to be home.”
I told him I was glad he enjoyed visiting with his family, but I was so happy he was home.
He looked me straight in the face and said “me too mom, it was nice having family time, but I’m so glad to be home now.” Ran over and gave me another big hug.
Damn it.
I really never wanted to have children. And here I am, with this boy who has completely and utterly given me his heart, stolen mine when I wasn’t looking.